Pages

Sunday, June 30, 2013

Hey guys, as you know Google reader is shutting down tomorrow. I'm still not really sure what this means for GFC and feedburner, but I ask you to please please follow me in an alternative way, preferably via Bloglovin'. It's a great reader for bloggers and you can import all the feeds you follow in Google reader in under a minute. If you don't follow me there yet, you can do so here:

You can also follow me via Feedcat or Networked Blogs, just check out the right sidebar. But bloglovin' is preferred, if I may say so ^^'

I really hope GFC won't be shutting down immediately and I hope to get through this transition losing as few of you guys as possible. I know I've been less active as of late but I really value your comments and support! I've got my good laptop back now so I should be posting more often again :)
I really appreciate your support over the last year and I'm hoping for many more months of fun blogging to come! Tomorrow I'll be part of the Cover Madness Giveaway Hop, and soon after I'll do a belated blogoversary celebration :) There should also be new reviews starting this coming week! I really need to catch up with all those amazing books I've already read.

Saturday, June 29, 2013

Stacking the Shelves is a weekly meme hosted by Tynga's Reviews to showcase all the books we got in the past week. Those can be bought, won, gifted, for review, borrowed, print or ebooks... no matter, just share what you got :)

Those are all presents from my amazing friend who also helped me format my harddisc on Thursday :) The comic is a belated B-day present and the others he gave me because he's going to buy the boxset and won't read them, and I only have book one.

Have you read any of these books yet? And what's new on your pile this week? Also, I have a discussion going on at the moment about how to deal with cheaters in giveaways, if you'd like to put in your two cents ;)

Thursday, June 27, 2013

Hey guys, this time my discussion topic is more related to the everyday stuff of blogging than to actual books.
But it's something that I think all of us bloggers are confronted with again and again:

Giveaway-cheaters: how do you handle them?

I just picked the winner for my Armchair BEA giveaway and was once more forced to delete faulty entries and disqualify people. Saying they follow when they don't, commented when they didn't, people simply writing 'done' into a field instead of copying the tweet-link or even simply putting a dot or a slash in. Seriously?! Do they think I'm stupid? That I don't check, even fleetingly? That if that entry was picked as the winner, I'd turn a blind eye? This is why I always check all the entries before I let random.org pick a winner. If entries like that stay in, they falsify the odds for everyone even if a valid entry is the winner.

But it's not just annoying, it also hurts me and makes me mad, to be honest. I'm not obligated to host giveaways. I pay for them with my own money. I do it because I like to. It's fun, it's a great way to bring awesome books to people (that's why I usually don't do 'book of your choice' giveaways but pre-select a dozen or so), it makes people happy which in turn makes me happy. And since I myself love to enter giveaways, it's a way for me to give back to the community. And yes, I admit it's not bad for the stats. But at the level where I'm at right now, it no longer makes my follower-count shoot up either. I'm familiar with most of the names showing up in the entries by now.

The cheaters won't make me stop hosting giveaways, but they do make me think. In case of the 'done' word in entries, do they maybe not understand the instructions? Is it mean of me to disqualify them? Should I just delete those of their entries that are faulty and leave the rest in? Then again, I don't think the rules are that hard to understand.

Plus, all the entry-checking takes HOURS, especially the GFC-verification. Do you guys have a trick how to do it more quickly? How do you handle this issue? Do you check at all? Do you disqualify? Do you have a 'black list' of notorious cheaters? Do you ever confront them with it if they do it more than once? Do you have a way to prevent cheating in rafflecopter? Do you use a different giveaway/entry form?
What's your experience? I'd really like to discuss this with other bloggers, so it'd be great if you could share the link to this post.
And if you're simply a blog-reader and don't have your own blog... have you ever considered this issue? Is what I just said surprising to you or more like 'duh, obvious'? Do the 'hoops' in giveaways annoy you, or do you thik the blogger has a right to ask something of you if they're offering up a free book? I'd like to hear opinions from all sides, so please feel free to comment! State your opinions people, but please do it respectfully.

Tuesday, June 25, 2013

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly feature hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. Every week the participants post their top ten to a specific topic.

This week's topic is the top ten books we've read so far in 2013.
Omg you gotta be kidding. I've read so many fantastic books, it'll be hard to choose only 10 >.<
No particular order.

Divergent, by Veronica Roth
The hype made me suspicious but WOW! I couldn't turn the pages fast enough, and I love Tris :)

In the Shadow of Blackbirds, by Cat Winters
Wonderful and complex, haunting, caught between science and magic in a period of war, sickness, and despair. And still there's a love story, told in the form of memories and by the ghost of a tortured young man.

Marking Time, by April White
I was so surprised and blown away by how much I loved this story! Time travel, paranormal creatures, abilities, grandiose setting, and most of all compelling characters! I've never read anything like it and I definitely need more ;)

Splintered, by A.G. Howard
And Alice retelling in a deliciously creepy wonderland. With Morpheus the moth boy and secret agendas and the threat of madness. More, please. I read the Unhinged sample chapters from Netgalley yesterday and now the wait is even more agonizing...

The Replacement, by Brenna Yovanoff
I cried my eyes out. In the best way. This book made me ache and I marked so many passages because of how beautifully they were written. I've wanted to read a changeling book like that for ages. And it's perfect just as it is. No sequel needed.

Just One Day, by Gayle Forman
It was so good that I bought her other books immediately afterwards and read all 3 in only one week. Gripping and realistic. It made me want to get up and be strong and face my life and try to really live it.

The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer, by Michelle Hodkin
What took me so long to catch on to the awesomeness of this series?!?! I read this book in a day. Noah Shaw is now among my top book boyfriends. I loved the dialogue, I loved Mara's family, I hurt for what she had to endure. Also, unreliable narrators are awesome. And the abilities here are really something different from the usual.

The Sea of Tranquility, by Katja Millay
Everyone says it's awesome and everyone is right. These characters are so unique and so realistic at the same time. I love how the events that lead to the characters being how and who they are are slowly revealed, and how there was more to even the minor ones that I'd supposed at the beginning. Really, really interesting dynamics.

Debt Collector serial, by Susan Kaye Quinn
Sci-fi is not my go-to genre, but seriously - this future noir/retro sci-fi series is amazing!! I had volume 1-3 from Netgalley but I had to go to Amazon and order and read 4-6 right away! The world building, characters, and intricacies are fantastic and gritty. I just couldn't stop reading. And despite the violence, it was fun too!

Dance of the Red Death, by Bethany Griffins
Characters, plot, beautiful writing, imagery... and the creepiness of Poe, the desperation of a dying world, the resolve of a girl caught in a deadly power game.

Runners-up:With All my Soul, by Rachel Vincent (the conclusion! Wrath! Kaylee! Tod!)Whither, by Lauren DeStefano (wonderful imagery, intriguing premise. Not so happy about the sequel.)Blood Rights, by Kristen Painter (it's hard to make vampires fresh and unique again but she did it)Shadow and Bone, by Leigh Bardugo (the world, the powers, the Darkling, the setting, the twists)

Gahh this nearly undid me with how many great books I couldn't feature, even though I sort of cheated with the runner-ups... Did you have a hard time choosing, too? What do you think of my picks, and what are yours?

Welcome to the cover reveal for Life, Love & Lemons by Magan Vernon, a YA contemporary! The cover is designed by B Design and the reveal organized by Giselle from Xpresso Book Tours.

I love the warm colors and the models' comfortable expressions! Below you can find out more about the book and its author.

Release date: August 2013

BOOK DESCRIPTIONWhen life hands you lemons, sometimes you have to say screw the lemons and bail.

Seventeen-year-old Bentley Evans had it all. Then her Dad got laid off.

Now she
has to move across town to a small apartment and leave her life
of luxury for public school and a job at the local burger place.
Just when her world seems like it's crumbling she finds solace in the
unlikely punk boy next door, Kai Rowe. But as their relationship
blossoms, a jealous ex-girlfriend and a secret to tell that threatens
to bring disaster back into Bentley’s life.

AUTHOR BIO

Magan Vernon is a Young Adult and New Adult
writer who lives with her family in the insurance capital of the world.
She is in a very serious, fake relationship with Adam Lambert and
constantly asks her husband to wear guyliner. He still refuses. She also
believes her husband is secretly an alien, disguised as a southern
gentleman.

Saturday, June 22, 2013

Stacking the Shelves is a weekly meme hosted by Tynga's Reviews to showcase all the books we got in the past week. Those can be bought, won, gifted, for review, borrowed, print or ebooks... no matter, just share what you got :)

Since I couldn't do a book haul post last week because of my computer problems and sudden escape to Italy, this is two week's worth of books. I'm really happy about all of them ^^

I loved Black City and needed Phoenix asap! I'm reading it like now and really liking where it's headed.Notes from the Blender is a book I'd won as an ebook already, but I just needed a print version. The paperback is out now so you can get it cheap - it's worth it for that beautiful cover alone! But the story is one of the best and funniest contemporaries I've ever read! You really should check it out :)

I've never read a Sherrilyn Kenyon book but I've been intrigued with the premise of Infinity for a while! I love reading guy-POV books every now and again. Plus, demon-hunters!
Everyone went nuts over The Collector. I'd planned to get the paperback but I couldn't resist it when it was that cheap. Savour You was only 99c when I got it last night. It's Kylie's story, and I really liked her character in Devoured. Article 5 is another one I was really interested in when it came out last year but I somehow never got round to it. I'm only now warming up to dystopians... that most people are getting sick of them :P Wonky timing.Some Girls Are sounds like a gritty contemporary revenge story, and I can't resist those. And Unmaking Hunter Kennedy is for when I'm in the mood for a typical summer read :)

Also, if you're interested in a post on cover design and stock art I did yesterday, you can check it out here.

Alrighty, that's it from me! Which ones of them have you read or are you excited to read? And what landed on your doormat this past week?

Friday, June 21, 2013

Hey guys :)
The cover phenomenon of sorts I've decided to call 'cover twins' is one that I see quite often when I go into the stores with German books here in Switzerland. It happens a lot that I see a book cover on a German edition that has stock art in it that was used for a different book in the US or UK edition - actually it worries me quite a bit that I see soooo many cover that I start recognizing elements even if they've been differently edited :P Here are two of the ones I've found recently. I might post more at a later point.

Note: I think I've seen a similar post on another blog last autumn, but I can't for the life of me remember where. This isn't a regular meme or anything, just a type of post I might do every once in a while. There are quite a few blogs doing cover wars or comparisons between different editions of the same book, so I lay no claim to any ideas here. If you know a blog doing the same thing or something similar, please tell me in the comments so I can give proper credit.

Shatter Me vs. Carrier of the Mark
The background isn't exactly the same, but Shatter Me (Fear Me, in the German edition) and Carrier of the Mark both use the same image. I own Carrier but haven't read it yet, and I also haven't read Shatter Me, so I can't say which book suits the image better or if it's fitting at all. It's pretty and eye-catching though, so I get why the German publisher chose it.

Die For Me vs. Masque of the Red Death
Hair, dress, pose, city backdrop and general color theme. The shoulder tattoo and the swirly pattern are pretty much the only difference in what was done with the stock art. I love the US Masque of the Red Death cover more, but I think the German one (City of the Red Death - The Girl with the Mask) represents the story pretty well too.

What do you guys think about this type of thing? Are the German publishers 'stealing' from books that have done well in the English-speaking world? Are they not creative enough to come up with a different, more unique design? On the other hand, it's stock art so anyone's allowed to use it. If you're an international blogger, have you noticed this type of thing in your own country? I'd love to hear your opinion :)

Goodreads description:What if your whole world was a lie?What if a single revelation—like a single choice—changed everything?What if love and loyalty made you do things you never expected?

The explosive conclusion to Veronica Roth’s #1 New York Times bestselling Divergent trilogy reveals the secrets of the dystopian world that has captivated millions of readers in Divergent and Insurgent.

I was way late to the party for this series but I read both Divergent and Insurgent in January. I can't wait for Allegiant now that the name and description are out and the Divergent movie is being filmed! I only just saw the UK cover that matches my editions so I decided to feature it here :)Have you read the series? Are you as impatient as I am? And what's your can't-wait-to-read book selection this week?

Tuesday, June 18, 2013

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly feature hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. Every week the participants post their top ten to a specific topic.

Hey guys! I'm back from my forced blogging break (read about it in yesterday's post if you want) and trying to make up my mind about a summer TBR. I never really plan what to read when apart from review books, but I have a lot of unread-but-owned books right now and here are some that I want to read over the summer, in no particular order.

Phoenix, by Elizabeth Richards
Okay, it technically hasn't arrived yet, but it's on its way and I neeeeed it so I will read it the minute it gets here!

The Secret of Ella and Micha, by Jessica Sorensen
I've owned it for months and finally want to read it! I'm way behind on my NA challenge and I remember all the good reviews of this one. Also, summer makes me feel more like reading contemporaries.

Legend, by Marie Lu
Owned it for a few weeks and its really short, so if I ever to to the beach/lake/whatever, it'll come with me :)

Looking for Alaska, by John Green
I gave this to my sister for Christmas, who has now borrowed it back to me... months ago. I finally need to sit down and read a John Green book but I know it'll make me cry so I kinda have to be in the right mood for it.

The Edge of Never, by J.R. Redmerski
Are you starting to see a pattern? Also, road trip.

Lola and the Boy Next Door, by Stefanie Perkins
I really liked Anna and the French Kiss and I'm so glad the matching paperback of Lola will be out soon-ish! It sounds like a great summer read :)

Exiled, by M.R. Merrick
Because it's been on my kindle for around a year and it sounds awesome and now there are already like 3 more books in the series and I'm way behind...

Flesh and Blood, by Kristen Painter
I devoured book one and I have book 2 on my unread pile. And I need some vampires every once in a while, especially if the worldbuilding makes the story refreshing in the way that book 1 did!

A Discovery of Witches, by Deborah Harkness
My friend is a huge fan and gave me her much-read and abused copy. She's been wanting to discuss it with me for nearly a year, so I must get round to it this summer ^^

What do you think of my list, and what are you planning to read this summer? Does the season influence your genre-reading-patterns?

Monday, June 17, 2013

Hey guys, you may or may not have been wondering why I dropped off the face of the earth for nearly a week. I already wrote a post on facebook about it but I know how those can slip by people, so I'll quickly explain it here.

On Thursday, in a moment of gullibility, I fell for an elaborate phishing/credit card fraud scam. I got suspicious after the fact and called the credit card company, and I just so managed to avoid losing 300 bucks to a bunch of hacker assholes. Unfortunately, my main computer is now full of spyware and I have to find a way to get rid of it without formatting my harddisc, because I have no system backups. Great isn't it? -__- Especially when you're writing a university paper just around that time and need to finish it on Friday before heading off to Italy. Instead you can spend your day doing damage control.

Anyhow. It sucks, the paper was written though not up to par with my usual work, and I hoped on a car to Italy. Where, on Saturday, I had my one year blogoversary... without a computer or any way/time to schedule posts or whatever. It was very relaxing though. Good for the soul. I could take a step back, enjoy a breathtaking view of the Lago di Lugano, read the second Mara Dyer book, and just... breathe.

Balcony breakfast

So that's why I didn't respond to comments or email and why there were no posts, not even a book haul. Again, I'm sorry and trying to fix things asap. I'm planning a giveaway to belatedly celebrate, as well as a couple posts on my first year of blogging. I don't think that I am in a position to give tips and act all pro-like and experienced, but I still feel like sharing what the past year was like for me and what I hope to do in the future. I hope you guys will stick with me despite my occasional social unresponsiveness because this blog and the people I met through it mean so much more to me than I ever anticipated!

Two days ago, she ditched her piercings and bleached the black dye from her hair.

Yesterday, knee socks and uniform plaid became a predator’s camouflage.

Today, she’ll find the boy who broke Claire.

By tomorrow, he’ll wish he were dead.

I've known about this one for a while but now that the release date is no longer ages off, I'm getting excited again! I love revenge stories. I want to know what happened to Claire. I want to know what will happen to Dinah's plans for revenge. I want to see the changes she goes through (pierced rock chick to bleach blonde preppy girl?) and just how far she's willing to take this.Have you heard of Premediated? Does it sound like your type of thing? Also, please link me up to your own WoW pick :)

Tuesday, June 11, 2013

Hey guys! I'm so stoked to be the release day stop on the Dance of the Red Death blog tour today!! Since the moment I finished Masque of the Red Death, I’ve been craving the sequel. When I got the news that I was chosen to be on the tour and would get to read it in advance, I did an embarrassing happy dance around the room. I loved the writing and atmosphere of the first book so much (read about it here) and the ending was cruel! My expectations for the sequel were high, especially considering that it would conclude the series, and I’m happy to say that they were met, though not entirely in the way I had expected, which is a good thing in my book!

You can read my review below, but first a little more info about the book and the author. Also, if you live in the US or Canada, don't miss the giveaway at the bottom!

Goodreads description:Bethany Griffin continues the journey of Araby Worth in Dance of the Red Death—the sequel to her teen novel Masque of the Red Death.

In Dance of the Red Death,
Araby’s world is in shambles—betrayal, death, disease, and evil forces
surround her. She has no one to trust. But she finds herself and
discovers that she will fight for the people she loves, and for her
city.

Her revenge will take place at the menacing masked ball,
though it could destroy her and everyone she loves…or it could turn her
into a hero.

With a nod to Edgar Allan Poe, Bethany Griffin
concludes her tragic and mysterious Red Death series with a heroine that
young adult readers will never forget.

ABOUT BETHANY
Bethany Griffin is a high school English teacher who prides herself on attracting creative misfits to elective classes like Young Adult Literature, Creative Writing, and Speculative Literature. She is the author of Handcuffs & MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH (April 2012). She lives with her family in Kentucky.

REVIEW
Dance of the Red Death picks up right where Masque left off and is every bit as cruel and unflinching about the world it portrays as the first novel, all the while keeping alive that sliver of hope us readers barely dare to hold on to out of fear that it might be crushed. Because I’ve read roughly a hundred books since finishing Masque, it took me a moment to find my way into the world and the exact place in the story again, but once I got my head around it I was once more fully engulfed and invested. If it’s been a while since you finished the first book, you might want to skim over the last couple chapters again if you don’t want to flounder around in the beginning.

I can’t say too much about the plot since it’s easy to spoil important points, but Dance begins with Araby’s group of sort-of-allies recovering out in the swamp outside the city and trying to fix up their airship while arguing about what to do next. Elliott wants to attack Prospero’s castle and return to the city a victorious hero, but Araby doesn’t believe that to be possible and thinks they should return right away. One reason for that is that April’s infection is getting worse, and Araby hopes that if they manage to find her father, he could have a cure.

Araby has come a long way from the detached, oblivion-seeking girl she was at the beginning! Despite still being injured, she shows a spine of steel and is willing to face danger aware of the possible consequences. She wants to find and confront her father, and if possible find a way to atone for what he did. She wants to stop both plagues and put an end to Prospero’s reign. And, of course, she also has to figure out her complicated tangle of feelings towards Elliott and Will.

If you’ve read my review of the first book, you know how I feel about the guys. Will may have betrayed Araby, but his reasons explain his behavior. I’d take him over calculating, possessive Elliott any day. So when Will seemed to be losing ground in the beginning, I admit I was worried and I hurt for him. Bethany Griffin has a great way of construing circumstances that foster mistrust and made me fear that I wanted so badly for the situation to be a certain way that I was ignoring the obvious. That’s one of the things I love so much about this series – you can never be too sure where you stand. Every word has weight, every piece of dialogue, every glance even, has a hidden meaning. So does every kiss, and there’s plenty of those ;)

Araby’s feelings for Elliott and Will are complex but she now knows better than to trust either one. What I loved about her arc was also her will to accomplish something on her own, without having to rely on either of the guys. She doesn’t have to love or choose either simply because they want her. I didn’t necessarily always agree with her actions and choices, but I understood why she made them. This love triangle, if it really is one, works for me because it’s layered and because all characters are really intriguing and the dynamics and shifts of power and influence between them fascinating! It’s never easy to say who’s in charge, who’s lying, who’s playing and manipulating whom.
However, not only the core-trio of Araby, Will, and Elliott is evolving, also April shows traits I would not have expected in her, and we learn more about Prospero, Malcontent, and Araby’s parents. There are also a few minor characters I found very interesting.

The pacing, as in the first book, is a slow, gradual build-up and I admit I was not quite sure where things were headed in the beginning. Thinking about it though, that makes sense considering the setting, the plague, the uncertainty, the chaos. Will Prospero seize power? Will Malcontent? Can Elliott succeed in dethroning his uncle, and if so, will that really make things any better? Will the only winner be the Red Death, in the end? Bethany Griffin sets up all the dominos in quiet deliberation, building up tension… then she lets them fall, and the plot unravels in twists and turns I never saw coming! As the end drew near, I was torn between craving to read fast to see what was happening and wanting to read slowly and savor the gorgeous prose and lush description.

I love how E.A. Poe’s work is woven into the story this time. I feel that it’s much closer to his short story than the first book. There, it’s mostly the general mood and the idea of wearing masks, of a plague raging outside while the wealthy and beautiful feast in a seemingly closed-off, sheltered space. In Dance, a lot more elements are picked up on and built into the tale with a twist. I can’t reveal more because I don’t want to spoil it for you, but let’s just say you will get more of the last few chapter’s if you’ve read Poe’s Masque of the Red Death.

As you can tell, Dance of the Red Death was fantastic to me. I loved the character and power dynamics, but above all the writing. Bethany Griffin knows how to craft an emotional punch into the simplest of sentences. She can make my heart clench with a single, well-placed cruel word. Much of the power of her language and of the emotions in the novel come from what is not said, what is implied between the lines or in gestures. I really like the way the story turned out, but I also feel bittersweet about the ending. I’m not ready to say goodbye, and at the same time, it’s a good place to leave things to the reader’s imagination. Regardless, I know that Araby, Will, Elliott, and April will haunt my mind for a long time to come, and I look forward to re-reading their adventures!

GIVEAWAY
- US / Canada only!
- Grand Prize- Poe Nail Decals, Masque of The Red Death inspired bracelet, Hardcover of Masque of the Red Death, bracelet, and a bookmark!
- 3 Hardcover of Masque of the Red Death, bracelet, and a bookmark!

Have you guys read Masque of the Red Death? Are you excited about the sequel? What do you think of my review, or the general idea of the series? I'd love to hear from you! Also, check out the rest of the tour below - there are some great interviews and guest posts!

anticipated books

FTC Disclaimer:

I don't know if I actually need one of those since I'm not a US blogger, but here goes: the books I review here were mostly paid for by myself, though I also receive e-copies via NetGalley. No matter how I got them, my reviews always represent my honest opinion and I do not nor will I ever accept financial compensation for them.